[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 56 (Tuesday, April 8, 2003)]
[House]
[Page H2867]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT?

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the order of the House of 
January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Hawaii (Mr. Case) is recognized 
during morning hour debates for 5 minutes.
  Mr. CASE. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my colleague from Texas, our 
respected majority leader, for his remarks this morning. I think I and 
all of us owe him a happy birthday wherever he may be and we wish him a 
happy birthday on, I believe it is his 56th birthday. Unfortunately, 
there my commendations have to end for the morning because as the war 
in Iraq comes to its inevitable close and our focus turns back to our 
domestic issues, our domestic challenges and as they turn back to the 
number one challenge that we face domestically, which is our Federal 
budget and fixing our economy, which is an area that the majority 
leader did not cover, I must say to my colleagues and my constituents 
back home and my fellow citizens that when it comes to the Federal 
budget that has been proposed by our President and embraced by our 
Republican colleagues and as it comes to that budget that we will see 
later on the floor this week, I must say I am tempted to feel relieved, 
and I am tempted to feel relieved, because for too long I have been 
worrying about the little things like our economy and jobs and money 
and debt and education and health care.
  At my State legislature like many of us in the State legislatures, I 
just spent a decade worrying about whether we had enough jobs, whether 
our taxes were fair, whether we were borrowing too much or whether we 
were spending too much, whether our kids were getting a good head 
start, whether our seniors had the basics, what my Hawaii would be like 
not next year but in 10, 20 years and what I could do to hand it off 
well. And at home, of course, because government is no different than a 
household in principle, my wife and I, we have long worried about our 
jobs and whether we could keep up with expenses, whether our debts were 
too high, whether our kids would grow up healthy, whether we could get 
a good, affordable education, whether our parents could live with 
decency. I am tempted to feel relieved because after all those years of 
worry both in my State legislature and at home, my Republican 
colleagues in the White House and here in the Congress have given me 
and are about to again give me a budget to vote on that says basically, 
do not worry, your fears are for naught. You can have your cake and eat 
it, too. You can do whatever you want. It will all work out. Do not 
worry, be happy.
  For example, let us take debt. My wife and I, we have been worrying 
about how much we owe. We do not like debt and when we have to incur 
debt we do not like it to get too high. We worry about retiring in 
debt. We worry about whether our kids are going to have to bail us out. 
We do not think that that is good for us and it is certainly not good 
for them. In the State legislature back in Hawaii, I worried for a long 
time about how much my State was borrowing, about whether our hard-
earned dollars were going just to pay off debt, whether we were handing 
off Hawaii in better shape to our children than the Hawaii that we had 
been responsible for administering. But now I am tempted to feel 
relieved, because I am told my Federal Government is somehow different, 
I am told debt is good, do not worry about it, that the largest debt 
run-up since President Reagan's era is no problem. And Alan Greenspan, 
somebody that says debt is not bad, chronic debt is bad. Chronic debt 
does not work. It leads to a worsening economy. It leads to interest 
rate increases. I am told about Mr. Greenspan, he is all wet, do not 
worry about him.
  Let us take taxes. In my State House, I embraced some tax relief in 
the 1990s, but I worried about whether that tax relief was going to 
those most in need, whether that tax relief was going to result in 
economic revitalization. I worried about the connection between lower 
taxes and an increased economy. Would cuts fix our economy? But here I 
am told, do not worry. We cannot give you any evidence of a connection 
between the tax cuts that we recommend and economic revitalization. And 
we do not have to worry about the Congressional Budget Office saying 
there is no connection. Do not worry, it will all work out.
  Let us take expenses, especially unknown or uncertain expenses. My 
wife and I worry about expenses that we know about and those that we do 
not yet know about. We worry about college. We worry about setting 
money aside. We worry about a little bit of a rainy day fund to worry 
about things that do not come along. But now I am told from this 
budget, do not worry, we do not need a little rainy day fund. We 
already have one. It is called Social Security. We can bail it out if 
we need to and we do not even have to include known expenses, expenses 
that we may not know how much they will be exactly but we sure know 
that they are coming.
  We all know, for example, that $75 billion is just the first 
installment of our obligations overseas for the war with Iraq. Yet that 
is not factored into this budget. Why not? I do not know. I guess I am 
being told, do not worry about it, it will come later. And do not worry 
about that. Do not worry about the long-term. We can get through the 
next couple of years. We can get through the things that are coming at 
us down the road. Do not worry about the projections of an increasing 
deficit, a deficit projected to increase by some estimates from 300 to 
$400 billion up to close to a trillion dollars, given the full impact 
of this tax cut. Do not worry about that.
  So I am a happy camper today. I do not have to worry. And if I were 
not so worried, I would be awfully scared.

                          ____________________